CAMEL

The snow goose was the first camel album i bought[cd] from a mail order company selling second hand cds and i saw it cheap and bought it after i watched the top ten prog program[channel 4 uk],with every song here on great form a really good listen,this album has like a late night relaxing feeling to it to me,how it starts with The Great Marsh is great how it starts really quiet gets volume up as it goes like and how then it goes into rhayader is great,and rhayader goes to town starts with a great guitar and this song i just enjoy everytime,sanctuary is a really calm song with nice relaxing guitar and keyboards really great to hear and relax to,the snow goose song i love the guitar here and the organ to[this reminds me a little of the shadows a little like the sound of the guitar],this is really a great song.friendship is a pete bardens song which it sounds and is short but really nice another good song,migration has like vocals with it the first so far like dooing and dahing kind of sound[i cant explain any other way and with calm drumming to.rhayader alone sound like another bardens song and is calm and relaxing again really nice.flight of the snow goose has guitar in this and more drumming and all sounds good here every member of camel on fine form the drumming is not loud but sounds good like,and the guitar here is more of the song really.preparation is really calm and i love the vocal part here sounds a little ghostly like a old hammer horror film with a ghostly likeoohing and ahhing,i love this.dunkirk with organ [calm at start] and occassional guitar bit for little,this is really nice again with the organ having more of lead role but the guitar does has more of later role and when it does it just sounds good this is great stuff with every member on great form great sounding prog.epitaph sounding like preparation sound with nice background pinging sound.fritha alone with a really nice piano playing calm and quiet really relaxing.la princesse perdue been the loudest song on album and gets calm in places for few seconds and when the keyboards play it sounds great so the guitar comes in and with a same playing song in bits as an earlier song called snow goose later on in song and nice to here playing again,the great marsh ends the album like the same how it started just fades out,and sounds great if you play album straight away after to,same like how pink floyds wall starts and ends like kind of,this album is a really nice great listen really relaxing and quiet like,if you fancy a relaxing quiet album now this is it,sounds great at night with a lamp on with a coal fire burning i reckon[i just wish i had a coal fire] its got that feeling to me,a nice listen,mostly instrumental but thats not a bad thing.4 stars.

I'd like to add my admiration for the remastered and expanded edition of this set, which introduced me to a better Camel than I'd ever heard before.

I first discovered Camel in the seventies. I bought MOONMADNESS as soon as it came out, I listened to MIRAGE and I even played the original LPs of A LIVE RECORD once or twice. None of them ever fully convinced me. It seemed Camel were, above all, a band of convincing BITS, with a few weird and wacky synth solos and some beautifully pure guitar solos, but also with thirteen-in-a-dozen organ solos and, worst of all, awfully lacklustre lead vocals.

Now on comes this expanded version of their classic live album, which has Richard Sinclair taking care of most of the vocals, thereby empowering the band a great deal and even turning them into some sort of "honorary Canterbury band". If you're not a fan of Sinclair's unheroic, South-East English enunciation, you may remain unconvinced, but in my opinion this was a huge step forward for Camel.

Even better, newly added tunes (i.e. not on the original LPs) like "Unevensong" and "The White Rider" are well worth hearing, with the band playing as if their lives depend on it. Also, in their remastered versions, it turns out Camel classics such as "A Song Within A Song" and "Lunar Sea" easily surpass the studio originals.

The same goes for the live version of "The Snow Goose", a concept album I've not always enjoyed. It usually seemed a haphazard combination of neo-Elizabethan dances, stale blues licks and second-rate movie melodies. To be sure, the version on the remastered A LIVE RECORD still contains some dodgy passages (with Peter Bardens's keyboards in particular failing to excite), but generally speaking the band play with such fervour that any weaknesses are soon forgotten. Many of Andrew Latimer's electric guitar solos are so... poetic (for want of a better word) I actually got tears in my eyes.

I don't believe any proggers have released a fully convincing extended composition featuring rock band and symphony orchestra as equal partners. But Latimer definitely played along with the London Symphony Orchestra and proved quite easily that he is as gifted as most classical oboists or violinists. Wonderful!

Camel's sixth DVD named Moondances released in 2007 as name implies conteining two concers, while promoting Moonmadness in 1976 and in 1977 Rain dances. First concert is filmed in 1976 in Hammersmith. Well this concert was for me a little deseppointing, because the prestation of the band is ok, the way they play without bursting moments as a concert must be is quite boring in places. I mean they are very good and talented musician but the almost whole show is forgetable, maybe Lunar sea or White Rider are the best moments here. Too flat, no comunication with the audience, it sounds like live in studio. For this concert 2.5 starsThe second part of the DVD is from the concert they made in 1977 at the Hippodrome while promoting Rain dances. With a diffrent line up, Richard Sinclair on bass and vocal replaceing Fergusson and on sax the excellent Mel Collins. Now , this concert is much better then the first, even some peoples say that the band best period is around 75-76, with this prestation they show that they are still in bussiness. Rain dances was a good album in Camel's discography, even in places were more towards canterbury because of Sinclair background, this album was good recived and is among better albums of the band. This concert is no diffrent, all musicians shines here, Sinclair voice is very smooth and fits ok in the Camel sound, alternating with Latimer's voice this concert is a winner, at least for me. The keys, the drums, sax all is more with balls and is clear that they play for pleasure. Pieces like Metrognome, Unevensong, Rhayader are perfect ex of good and enjoyble concert all the way. I prefer this one over the 1976 show by miles, here the band is better in musical terms. So , I will give 3.5 rounded to 4 stars, because I've always liked Camel's music, this DVD is definetly a good one and spoted Camel in one of their best moments.

Camel Madness

While I'm not used to reviewing a popular *prog* album giving it the same rating as most reviewers give it, but nevertheless I feel I have to give my own opinion about this album since I see a lot of the non-Camel fans that either consider this their only decent effort or, on the contrary, a weak effort compared to Mirage. Being a big fan of Moonmadness, I understand most of these people's opinions and can't denie many aspects that the album is associated with, yet I love it for what it is.

To start with, Moonmadness, but generally Camel overall, were never and will never be considered much of a rockin' Progressive Rock band, if not quite the contrary, a rather melancholic and chilling affair which is quite clear on The Snow Goose. However, with Mirage and, in a lesser extent, their debut showed Camel clearly playing in a pretty heavier way than they're known for, thus prog fans who prefer a more active and instantly memorable Progressive Rock definitely consider any of these two albums their best albums, and by far since The Snow Goose and Moonmadness(their other highly acclaimed albums) tend to delve into the melancholic and jazzier progressive kind of affair, definitely albums that are neither instantly grabbing nor meant to rock out with.

Nonetheless, as a big fan of the four aforementioned albums I've always considered Moonmadness to be their musical peak, in both senses, compositionally and instrumentally. While Moonmadness definitely follows the instrumental and melancholic mood of The Snow Goose, Camel expanded from there and added the rock substance that The Snow Goose, while it's not that it lacked in a negative way, but simply didn't have because it didn't need it. This new rock substance however is not used in the way Mirage used it(for a rawer and energetic sound); Moonmadness fuses this with the melancholic aspects and as a result they created the perfect, matured, balance between the lovely tranquility of The Snow Goose and the edgier Mirage. The perfect example of this is the outstanding performance on Chord Change which changes drastically from the semi-frenetic jazzy-esque intro with Doug and Andy Ward giving a splendid rhythm, to a totally calm and charming atmosphere with Andy's delightful guitar playing and then leaving the spot for the overlooked, great jazzy keyboardist, Peter Bardens to finish this brilliant soulful passage.

Anyways, Lunar Sea and Song Within a Song are also pretty fine examples of the this blend between The Snow Goose's charm and Mirage's more symphonic rock style. However, something I've noticed specifically in these two tunes is the jazz-fusion feel which works as a main feature unlike in the three previous albums which served as an additional feature solely. To enter in more details with these two brilliant tracks, Lunar Sea is undoubtly the epitome of Camel in the instrumental side of things: it has a one-of-a-kind spacey atmosphere all through the tune in which the rhythm section settles a very addictive pattern in which at first Andy adds an emotive guitar solo but later on it's the turn of Peter and his mesmerizing synth which takes your mind to a ''lunar sea'', simply gorgeous. After that wonderful experience, Andy reprises but with a more ferocious guitar playing and the rhythm responds the same way. About Song Within a Song, it's a much chilling track full of lush keyboards and some sweet flute work very alike that from The Snow Goose. The few vocals that the song has are drowned with a watery-effect and fits with the song and the album perfectly. The song finishes with a great instrumental passage with Peter's fabulous synth work.

The four remaining tracks are a bunch of pretty good tunes which full-fill the album's mood very well. Air Born and Spirit of the Water belong to the gentle, melancholic and dreamy style of The Snow of Goose, very beautiful. Another Night, on the other hand, is Camel playing the rock style of Free Fall again but without the rawness neither the edge of it, still pretty decent with a rockin' organ solo at the end. Finally, Aristilus is a pompous introduction to Moonmadness played solely by Peter Barden's set of keyboards.

As you have may noticed, my conclusion is definite: this album is essentially Camel's peak; it has the group's whole heart and soul in it and still there's room for their underrated talents at full shape. Surely not one of the best Prog Rock records ever made, but it's still a very unique masterpiece even when it doesn't feature any innovations or lots of complexity: the same goes for Pink Floyd's masterpieces, though you can add the innovation bit to them.

Jenny Agutter Broke My Heart

Camel's 3rd album is arguably their best and probably richly deserving of all the plaudits heaped on it during the intervening years. It seems that the success of the Tolkien sourced White Rider on the previous Mirage album provided sufficient encouragement for Bardens and Latimer to expand their canvas to encompass a fully fledged conceptual work. Various literary sources were considered including Herman Hesse's Siddhartha, but Camel mercifully abandoned an adaptation of this grovelling apology for western wickedness (after just a casual glance at the lyric sheet provided with Close to the Edge presumably)

Paul Gallico's short novel The Snow Goose from 1940 seems an odd source for the muse to be sure. I mean it's a nice little heart-tugger and all but inhabits a world so soft and fluffy that Barbara Cartland could conceivably be summoned as the defendant in one of its obscenity trials. Enough already, I know that all male proggers of a certain vintage would have fallen hopelessly and madly in love with Jenny Agutter courtesy of the 1971 film version starring Richard Harris.

Given the particular historical events that the story rests upon (the Dunkirk evacuation during World war Two) it's hardly surprising that the accompanying music has a markedly English/Northern European flavour, shorn of all habitual rawk artifices and without a trace of blues anywhere to be found. Personally I find this refreshing as you can get a bit jaded with pale white boys from Solihull paying their dues to a Delta most of whom think is an Italian rally-car.

The Great Marsh - Seems to take an eternity for this little teaser to finally uncloak itself but a suitably atmospheric intro that sets the gentle and wistful mood appropriately enough.

Rhayader - Glorious and indelible theme that represents an amalgam of English folk music and the European classical canon. Think of Focus sparring with Jethro Tull and you might just be in the ball park/soccer stadium. When the core quartet embark on the central improvisation section they inhabit a sound world not a million miles away from Greenslade.

Rhayader Goes to Town - Clever use of disorienting electronica via the synth ostinato which punningly alludes to the protagonist's alienation from and reluctance to engage with the modern world (Rhayader is a hermit artist who lives alone in a lighthouse, although I can't recall too many reported instances of overcrowding in the lighthouse industry) Rips along like a high speed train containing one very uncomfortable commuter who clearly believes himself to be in a state of the art slave galley. Several of the melodic themes used on Snow Goose can be viewed as a Prog twist on Wagner's classical leitmotif idea i.e. the personality and mood of the characters is mirrored by the musical materials. That twee, clumsy but still loveable synth motif that lurches unannounced onto centre-stage, perfectly captures Rhayader's risibility in the eyes of a dismissive urbanity. The slower guitar solo section always reminds me of Gilmour in Floyd.

Sanctuary - Given the title, a fitting contrast to the disruptive urgency and frisson of the previous track. Gentle finger-picked acoustic guitar provides a soft bedding for a haunting flute stated melody which segues into a achingly beautiful electric guitar passage right up there on a par with any of Focus's finest contributions to instrumental rock. (Praise indeed)

Fritha - Were you to pan all the concealing mud, debris and rock out of many a celebrated prog epic, what remains would still be outshone by this humble little jewel.

Friendship - Jauntier than an epidemic of terminal jauntiness, this short classically inspired tune scored for reeds and wind just bounces joyfully around like a toddler on a bouncy castle. At less than two minutes such bonhomie is not requiring of any deflating pin from your reviewer.

Migration - A rare instance of vocals on this album, albeit wordless Hatfield & the North style critters. Migration always conjures up unrelated imagery of Carnaby Street, mini-skirts and the swinging 60's as envisioned by Ealing Studios for this rodent. (Dunno...Straight Edge Psychedelia ?) Despite that, yet more very strong musical ideas that like so many on this record, prove resilient to the stylistic garb they are clad in.

Rhayader Alone - Introspective and moody electric piano that captures our hero's inevitable but still mourned isolation perfectly.

Flight of the Snow Goose - Crackling synth arpeggio that prefaces such use as implied harmony on what passes for sophistication in the dance fraternity. Another addictive guitar theme that is hard to dislodge once entry is permitted into the listener's head.

Preparation - Restive guitar picking wedded to some fondant flute which transitions into a foreboding drone based groove over which a cherubic female/prepubescent choirboy cast cloistered whispers. Those of you familiar with Rick Wakeman's No Earthly Connection will discern similarities between the former's The Reaper and this number.

Dunkirk - Possibly my favourite Camel track ever and a salutary lesson in how to gradually build and pace an arrangement that allows all the constituent parts to have their own little window from which to cast the sunlight. Camel also manage the very ticklish feat of combining orchestral sources with the electric band on Dunkirk which is often an elusive mixture even for the more celebrated Olympians in the prog pantheon. This would be the audible results of thematic ideas being allowed to organise and arrange themselves without an ego in the vicinity. Music would be this democratic but for musicians alas.

Epitaph - A short reprise of the Preparation materials.

Fritha Alone - Very plaintive and moving solo piano piece (although I detect an overdubbed part in the higher registers ?) What proof is required for its beauty is that on ceasing, you just want it to start over again.

La Princesse Perdue - Emerging dancing village strings a la Bartok which preface a tremulous and exhilarating synth lead before Latimer's guitar, for all intents and purposes, practically defines noble, stately and borderline aristocratic in equal measure. I hear many textural similarities on this tune with that of Wakeman's more enduring work for electric band and orchestral forces.

The Great Marsh II - The sequel. Just when you thought it was safe to go back in the swamp. Let's face it and forgive it: Prog concept albums have had these little tail-enders linking back to opening material since God was in short pants. (No I don't mean Jon Anderson, even short pants look like long un's on that elfin warbler)

If you were to recommend a starter pack for a prog newbie then you could do a lot worse than suggest The Snow Goose. It just might represent the perfect stepping stone for an inquisitive listener to venture into the wonderful world of Progressive Rock. The fact that it is almost entirely instrumental would certainly prepare an initiate for the abiding thrust of the genre's style.

Yes, the music is relatively gentle and accessible but never bland and as I alluded to in my review, musical ideas this strong are sufficiently 'well hard' to withstand any stylistic interpretation.

PS Jenny Agutter, we forgive you.

More prog than the debut, hence the slightly higher PA rating. This is due to the presence of two multi-part mini-suites, ''Nimrodel'' and ''Lady Fantasy''. Both are well played featuring a vast collection of keyboard sounds, hard-rocking guitar solos and a few theme changes that sound natural. The epics are symphonic in nature with ''Nimrodel'' scoring points for featuring what sounds like a festive orchestra in the beginning of the piece.

The song ''Freefall'' is of personal importance to me because it was the song that helped invigorate my interest in Camel. I had thought they were a completely tepid, boring, lazy jazz- inspired prog group until my friend played me ''Freefall'' and my interest quickly changed. It sounds nothing more than 60's psych-rock leftovers, but if that one song re-energizes my interest in a band, there's got to some magic somewhere.

The other two numbers are ''ho-hum'' jazzy instrumentals; ''Supertwister'' is interesting due to the flute playing, but that's about it. But overall, this is a very well-played, well-executed prog rock album that most fans of the genre should try out.

Last words: Note the sparse use of vocals here.

A good dose of ''oomph'' is what this album could've used; I may have upped the rating by a star if I felt that ''oomph'' was there. However, I feel this album and the following album (MIRAGE) are of the same calibre in terms of musical prowress and captivation. Personally, I think MIRAGE and CAMEL are just as good as each other, but objectively speaking, CAMEL loses on PA because the progginess isn't as there as MIRAGE.

This is more of a hard rock album than anything else, taking hints from the Cantebury scene and a tad of the Pink Floyd sound. Tracks like ''Slow Yourself Down'' and ''Separation'' veer more towards hard rock than prog, but have this captivating staying power that makes both of them good, particularly when Latimer gets to solo. Others like ''Arubaluba'' and ''Never Let Go'' gives clues to the prog direction Camel would partake on their next album.

Last words: It's really a matter of what you like. I couldn't get into Camel until the rockier songs hit me and made me appreciate Camel. Expect some long, jam-type instrumental passage that may not be of the most ''exciting'' of sorts, but those with a sense of melody or patience (or both) shouldn't have problems getting into Camel's debut.

Andy Latimer and Andy Ward would be the only two remaining after the last record "Breathless",although Mel Collins does guest on one track.So enter new members Colin Bass on bass,along with Kit Watkins(HAPPY THE MAN) and Jan Schelhaas on keyboards.Phil Collins adds some percussion. Rupert Hine is the producer which certainly didn't surprise me when i heard this record,simply because it's very commercial sounding and light for the most part. "Wait" is uptempo and very dated sounding to these ears.That late seventies poppy sound is alive and well here.It's awful.And no i don't care that there are four Moog solos. "Your Love Is Stranger Than Mine" continues in that light poppy sound.Yikes. "Eye Of The Storm" is the first half decent tune.Apparently this was originally a HAPPY THE MAN instrumental.Kit plays keyboards and flute here. "Who Are We" atually sounds like CAMEL but it's nothing to write home about.I'm not a fan of the orchestration. "Survival" is a short orchestral piece. "Hymn To Her" is the best so far.The beginning is just gorgeous,it reminds me of the "Moonmadness" album.Jan is playing the Grand Piano here while Andrew shines on vocals and guitar. "Neon Magic" is a return to blah really. "Remote Romance" is the worse track on here,and that's saying something.Those sequencers just don't work,neither do the almost spoken vocals.Just shoot me please! "Ice" is a complete surprise considering all that has gone on before it.How do you explain this over 10 minute instrumental that is filled with emotion and passion.It's one of CAMEL's best compositions on a bad album.It's also one of Latimer's best solos. Certainly "Ice" and "Hymn To Her" made me think about giving this 3 stars,but the rest just drags this album down to far.

Wait, wait wait! For all those ready to throw the stone upon this one! Just remember the times , this album was relesead and imagine the pressure Camel had to bare! Imagine, being in Latimer's seat after a ten year (almost) career and you are obliged to produce a hit single because your contract is loosing grip... What do you do? You do this album which is a perfect balance between your roots and the commanding reality of your record company... Of course, being so much pressured causes side effects and this can be seen in this album as it can be seen on The Single Factor Album. But just be patient and start the album.. Wait, wait, wait! Is this one a pop song...well i hope pop was always like this one! Listen carefully this well crafted song and the excellent mini moog solos by two of the most underestimated keyboard heroes mr Kit Watkins and Jan Schellas, not to mention the solid sound of mr Bass and the wiseful drumming. Yes, i hear you say... this album is a disgrace comparing to the Mirage album or The Snow Goose album or th Moonmadness album... All right then... i will pass the pop elegant graceness of Your Love Is Stranger Than Mine with the lyrical saxophone solo by mr Collins (Mel, of course), the ambient tendencies of Kit Watkins's Eye Of The Storm and the pop-prog Who we Are (what an intro for a pop song!), Survival, which is a just a wonderfull glimpse to full symphonic music...i won't say anything about Hymn To Her-prog purists please open your ears for this one and listen to the excellent mid section solos and what comes a little bit after those solos, how more symphonic rock can it be? Ok, two songs coming after this one...Neon Magic, well Uk were doing the same thing a little bit proggier i suppose or am i wrong...all right Neon Magic is ,if you take out mid section , a very prog music section for the times, just quite odd for Camel tradition...of course Remote Romance is a a kind of a joke for me, joke for Camel themselves too, being ironic to their times they were having as 30something years old men then...i hope you understand what i am trying to say...some of you remember those times with the punk explosion, or the arise of the new wave movement or the first steps of electronica and so on...Camel made an experiment on this one , not quite bad for the kind of music Remote Romance represents. And finally we come to the great finale, the song that alone itself worths the buy or the listen for this album. Few words for this masterpiece-just let yourself flow in this one, have chills with every single note played by mr Latimer, be spaced out with the mini moog solo and again have chills with all the notes played by this very , very , very special guitarist mr Andrew Latimer. Last but not least, is one of the "teachers" of drumming, so much underestimated, the one and only Andy Ward! Ice, is an excellent example of intelligent drumming, for those who can hear and understand! To prog purists-you are right! this isn't Moonmadness, but it isn't 1976, it is 1979, do you remember? ok, for you, two star rating album, i can see your point! But as an album itself and the times released...a four star rating! Ice, itself, deserves the full five stars!

I like being pleasantly surprised. When I picked this up several weeks back I expected it to be fairly good like the majority of everything else I've heard by Camel but I didn't know it would be so consistently delightful. If you know anything about this group you know that they're anything but boisterous, relying on a softer approach to get their progressive point- of-view across. There are times when that's exactly what my anxious brain or troubled mood yearns for. I'm not saying that this is some kind of wishy-washy, meditative new age B.S. that can double as a generic alternative to counting sheep and popping two Tylenol PMs. Believe me, if that's what this was I wouldn't put up with it beyond the first minute. Get thee behind me, Yanni! No, this is quality prog from the early 80s that respectfully contains a healthy dose of what had allowed the mellower side of 70s progressive rock to ingratiate itself into contemporary/popular styles so discreetly. The malicious force known as MTV was still deceivingly benign; slithering about in its cute, incubatory phase when this record was released and, therefore, "Nude" is one of the last stragglers of that waning golden era to proudly wave its shiny prog banner as the legions of anti-creativity Blue Meanies gathered on the horizon.

Make no qualms about the band's history, though. The yellow brick road hadn't been a cake walk for this group. By 1981 Camel had reinvented and repopulated itself a few times over and was at this juncture head honcho Andrew Latimer's baby all the way as he wrote or co-wrote every note of this one. My sombrero's off to him, too, because there's not a runt in the litter (okay, maybe there's a mutt or two). While it's essentially a concept album built around the tale of a castaway WWII soldier (Nude) unintentionally quarantined from the rest of the world for 29 years before being rescued, the somewhat shallow plot takes a back seat to the music and never gets preachy or overly sentimental. This is respectable prog that won't scare anyone, even your pet Guinea Pig. I'm willing to bet your wife and/or mistress will not object. Everybody wins!

They begin meekly with a light sprinkle of pop on "City Life" in which Alan Parsons' influence is noticeable except that this is what his Project should've evolved into instead of becoming the soulless, plastic hit machine they became. The song has a silky smooth surface and is obviously radio-friendly yet it maintains a level of integrity. Mel Collins' spicy sax solo could have elevated it but his reedy blowing suffers from being kept too low in the mix to make a difference. The sparse lyrics describe a young urban boy confused about what to spend his life doing. "Wake up, wake up/signs tell the time you're wasting," Andrew croons. "Nude" is next and after a soothing piano and cello opening the tune flows as free as a mountain stream. Here our protagonist's existential dilemma is solved by a draft notice that makes his life-choice for him whether he cares to tote a loaded rifle or not. It's implied that he's a bit of a reluctant would-be killer who realizes that he has no alternative but to "live without remorse for the deeds I'm bound to do." The tune lolls a little until Andy Ward's drums' delayed entrance allows the number to pick up welcome steam. They then segue seamlessly into six consecutive, entertaining instrumental tracks, starting with "Drafted," a cut that has Latimer performing a stately slide guitar theme that's stirringly inspiring.

"Docks" is a Pink Floyd-styled song, well-constructed and festively decorated with firm dynamics. Andrew's understated guitar work is graceful throughout. "Beached" is even more up-tempo as Duncan Mackay's tasteful keyboard settings along with Ward's intricate drumming impress and the sudden appearance of a clean brass section is a nice touch. It's nothing spectacular, mind you, but there are enough varied elements involved to hold your interest until they get to the next (and best) number, "Landscapes." This gorgeous, ethereal piece alone is worth the price of admission. A deep, reverberating keyboard surrounds the soothing flute melody like a warm halo and my only complaint is that it's over way too soon. I could lounge in its luxury for another ten minutes. Easy.

Slightly world-beat, tribal-like drums characterize "Changing Places" as they rumble beneath harmonizing flute lines. The tune effectively summons a vivid visualization of Nude finding himself stranded on his lonely island paradise and Mel's flute flurries are colorful and uplifting. "Pomp & Circumstance" is another lovely composition that blends multiple synthesizers expertly, leading to a barely audible military snare and a single rifle shot at the end. Despite his isolation, our plucky infantryman has steadfastly enforced his loyalty to his sworn duty by staying vigilant, regularly discharging his firearm into the air. "Please Come Home" is a tiny song that brings to mind Supertramp and through which we are informed that our boy has, at long last, been found. "Reflections" follows and it's another well-executed soundscape that demonstrates explicitly how sublime subtlety can not only be heartwarming but highly admirable as prog art. Skeptical about the war being over, Mr. Survivor resists his rescue at first. "Captured" is a perky instrumental too reflective of the New Wave mannerisms prevalent at the time and it's the nadir of the proceedings because of that mundane flavoring. Kind of a cheesy soundtrack more befitting a modern jazz/ballet dance recital at the local high school, if you know what I mean and I think you do.

A hero's welcome greets the overwhelmed Nude in "The Homecoming," a Sousa-like snippet that's essential to the plot yet adroitly avoids being an embarrassment. "Lies" is another Alan Parsons Project protégé with Andrew's fluid guitars teeming, a funky breakdown in the middle that wisely employs a dense, growling Hammond organ (always a huge plus in my book) and a Latimer guitar ride towards the end that's exquisite. Far from being grateful, our star of the show is rather bitter. "Can you disguise/can you simplify/this change you put me through?/can you revive/and will I survive/this life you've brought me to?" he exclaims. The finale is "The Last Farewell." While Andrew reprises an earlier theme, Colin Bass' fretless bass adds a bounty of class before the band closes with a wistful musical aura reminiscent of Genesis during their awesome "Wind and Wuthering" days. The story's coda (spelled out in the liner notes) informs us that our man, disgusted with the phoniness of the requisite15-minutes-of-fame global community he's been brought back to, simply vanishes one day. We are left to surmise that he's returned to the peace and solitude of his south sea isolation. Good for him.

I have yet to find a truly poor Camel album. If you haven't waded into the dromedary waters as of yet I can only tell you that you're depriving yourself of a treat. While "Nude" isn't a masterpiece, it still deserves your consideration as an open-minded progger. If you take into account the "prog is for dweebs" mentality that the punk rockers bent on anarchy and the holier-than-thou New Wavers had forced upon the up-and-coming "videos rule" generation, it shines quite brightly. While Genesis was quickly turning into just another arena rock & roll band, while Yes was frantically looking for their lost Tibetan monk mojo and ELP's legacy was as dead as chivalry these guys were determined to hang on to their prog identity while adventurously incorporating ever-improving studio recording processes and techniques into their sound. Whatever you do, don't make the mistake of overlooking these fellas. They were still prog when prog wasn't cool anymore. 3.9 stars.